Have a question about how the TVTropes wiki works? No one knows this community better than the people in it, so ask away! Ask the Tropers is the page you come to when you have a question burning in your brain and the support pages didn't help.
It's not for everything, though. For a list of all the resources for your questions, click here. You can also go to this Directory thread
for ongoing cleanup projects.
To retain the title analogy, Kick the Dog is opposed to the neutral of Left The Dog Alone. Usually it means going out of their way to do something evil. I would accept the "driving over children's toys" as intended to show that the character would do the same if it was a dog (except dogs tend to move, so it wouldn't work).
The second example doesn't seem an example; the dogs are an active threat to the Terminator, not just running around).
Link to TRS threads in project mode here.
Still, the T-800 didn't go out of his way to run over the toys. They were in his way, and he saw no reason to avoid them. For an emotionless killing machine, anything less than a straight line to your destination is inefficient.
That, and the character in question isn't human; it's a programmed robot. It doesn't feel any need to do evil; it's just programmed to follow orders and directives. It ultimately has nothing against human characters trying to stop it, it's just doing what it needs to do to complete its mission.
I don't think Kick the Dog can be applied to a character like this.
Kick the Dog isn't a character motivation though (For the Evulz is the character motivation), it's something the creators show the character doing to clue the audience into how the character thinks. The "any collateral damage is acceptable" is a motive that can be ascribed to the T-800. It does not attempt any mitigation of collateral damage, even if that mitigation would cost no effort.
Link to TRS threads in project mode here.
Even ignoring the fact that he's a machine, the first one is a huge stretch (seeing that they're just toys), and the second is definitely not an example. My vote is to zap the entire thing.
Edit: I've changed my mind about the first one, so ignore that. I was focused on people using the word "evil", but the trope allows for things that are just mean or uncaring.
Edited by supergod For we shall slay evil with logic...
I'm with crazy. The entire point of it is that they're so inhumane that they don't care about the Dead Doll Shot. It's an intentional act by the creator to clue the audience in that "hey, these guys? Total assholes."
Second is massive name-based shoehorn, though.
Edited by Larkmarn Found a Youtube Channel with political stances you want to share? Hop on over to this page and add them.
Alright, I cut the second example. I still believe the first example doesn't belong, but if everyone is saying keep it, I'll leave it alone.
So there are two examples of Kick the Dog under The Terminator. By definition, Kick the Dog is doing something evil just for the hell of it. Not really sure if either of these examples fit.
The first one is that the T-800 runs over some toys. It wasn't that he ran them over on purpose, he simply saw no reason to avoid them when they were in his way. Pretty sure that an aversion of Pet the Dog does not automatically default to Kick the Dog.
The second example is the ternimator gunning down some dogs in the future. That's being pragmatic if anything, seeing as they had compromised his disguise.
Just wanted to make sure there was an agreement here before I axed the examples. I already removed a misused example of Pet the Dog.